


Changeling Child

by PaintedPianoBlack



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Gen, changeling!Bae, warning: sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-22
Updated: 2014-04-22
Packaged: 2018-01-20 09:16:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1504985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PaintedPianoBlack/pseuds/PaintedPianoBlack
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Baelfire is a changeling. Rumplestiltskin loves him anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Changeling Child

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Heather Dale's song of the same name, and very very sad.

The winter mist swirled around her, a cold mockery of a lover’s embrace. She pulled her cloak tight around her and trudged on through the night. Her destination loomed in the distance, a ring of tall stones standing lonely vigil on the moonlit moor. It was said that if one went there on a winter’s night and wished with all their heart, that all one’s wishes would come true. Milah had never held much stock in fairy tales, but she hoped against hope that this one was true.

 

It had been weeks since her husband had left for the war front. She knew all too well that there was little chance of him returning. She had long since resigned herself to never seeing Rumplestiltskin again. Still, there was one problem that she had not foreseen. While other families, having lost husbands and sons to the war, would receive help from others in the village to keep their homes livable and their pantries full, she could count on no such assistance. It seemed that her husband’s history would not die with him, and she would be doomed to bear the yoke of “coward’s wife” until the end of her days. But, she thought to herself, she need not bear it alone.

 

She thought of leaving the village, making her own way in the world. But there was scarcely money in the house to eat, and she’d no horse nor mule, nor any way of supporting herself on her own. Her mother had been fiercely determined about that as she’d grown up- whether to keep her daughter from straying from her husband or from her own clutches, Milah wasn’t sure. But from her mother she knew the one thing that every woman could count on, should her husband die- a child. A child would be loyal to her, a child would help her as she grew old. With a child, perhaps she could make a new life for herself. But her marriage had been childless, whether due to yet another of her husband’s defects or one of her own, she did not know.

 

But she had heard the stories, about mystical creatures that dwelt just out of mortal reach and that could, on occasion, be persuaded to grant the impossible- for a price. As she weighed the consequences of attempting to struggle on alone, she decided that no price could be so dear that she would not pay it to ensure her future. This child would save her. Would save them both.

 

As she neared the stones, the wind rose about her, whipping and whistling around the rocks with a low moan. It was as it she pained the earth by treading it. She thought that now and again she could see flecks of dancing light out of the corner of her eyes, but they disappeared whenever she looked. Finally at the edge of the ring she paused a moment, gathering her courage before taking the final steps into the stone circle.

 

At first the clearing seemed no different from outside the ring, but as she neared the center she became increasingly aware of shadows moving behind her, of distant giggling voices just beneath the howl of the wind. She stopped in the middle of the ring, raising her head high to address the empty air.

 

"Spirits, faeries, whatever you may be who will hear my plea! I wish to bargain with you!"

 

Is that so?

The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, neither male nor female, yet seemingly both at once. Milah started, and whirled around to find a black cloaked figure standing behind her, hood up and towering. She faltered a bit before speaking again.

 

"Y-yes. My name is Milah and-"

 

Foolish girl, to share your name so freely.

 

"-and I’ve come to bargain for a child." She finished, ignoring the being’s interjection.

 

A child? And why would you want a thing like that? Most women I meet seem to want me to take the burden of motherhood from off their shoulders.

 

"My husband- he’s gone off to war and I know he’ll not return. I cannot keep the house on my own forever and I’ll get no help from the village. Please, I need this child or I don’t know what else I’ll do."

 

Then a child is what you truly want? A swaddling babe to love and call your own? To comfort you in your old age?

 

"Yes! Can you give me that?"

 

There is nothing that I give. This boon must be earned. All things have their price, and a child is a valuable thing indeed.

 

"Then I’ll pay for it! Just tell me what I must do."

 

This is not that kind of bargain. The price will reveal itself to you in time.

 

"Then… I can have the child?" She asked hopefully.

 

…Yes. Come forward, girl.

 

Milah did as she was told, approaching the hooded figure cautiously. The spirit held out a small bundle that had seemingly appeared from the folds of its cloak, handing it to her silently. She clutched the parcel to her chest, smiling as she felt the being within move gently. She lifted the blanket from off the top of the bundle, looking down at the sleepy, pink-faced babe in her arms. His eyes were darker than any child she’d ever seen- but perhaps it was for the best. Her husband’s eyes were dark; there’d be no prying questions about how she came by the child. 

 

She lifted her head to thank the spirit, but the hooded specter was gone; only mist and stones met her gaze. The babe made a stifled cry at the cold, and she quickly pulled her cloak around them both, hurrying back toward home. She’d worry about the spirit’s price later; now she had her child, and all was well. 

 

——————-

 

Rumplestiltskin had come home. She’d not expected that. But there he was, blatant and unabashed of the shame he’d brought her, of how he’d ruined her plans. She’d not known quite how to react, so when the rage and shame took hold of her she’d let it go. He’d not fight back; he hadn’t the spine for it. So she’d fled off into the night in search of a drink to forget her problems at least until morning, leaving him holding the babe he’d been so ready to believe was his own.

 

He hadn’t questioned the name she’d given the child, and for that at least she was grateful. It had come to her of a sudden when she’d returned home that fateful night, borne on the same whistling wind that had followed her path. She wondered if that was what he was called back in… wherever he came from. It certainly sounded mystical enough. Baelfire. It sounded like a spell. She only hoped that she’d not brought a curse upon her in speaking the name. 

 

She thought then, of the spirit’s foretold price. Perhaps that was what had brought her husband back. If she was to have the boon of a child, she was to suffer the burden of her husband’s reputation, now even more tarnished and blackened than ever before. She hastened her pace toward the tavern. So be it. If this was all the good the babe had brought her, then perhaps it was best she left him alone with his scorned excuse for a father. Rumplestiltskin had at least seemed to genuinely care for the child. They would have each other, then; and if time did not ease the hardship of life in the village then, well, she’d hardly be missed if she were to set off on her own, rid of this old life of cowards and spirits.

 

—————— 

 

Back inside the little house, Rumplestiltskin cradled his son, amazed at the quite gentleness of the babe. He’d never known a child so silent, nor one with eyes so dark. The boy must have been born some weeks ago for his eyes to have already changed from newborn blue to their deep shade. He smiled to think on it; the boy had his eyes. Eventually the child grew quieter still, lulled off to sleep by the warmth and gentle motion of his father’s arms.

 

As he settled his child into the small cradle near the warming fire, Rumplestiltskin couldn’t help but wonder at the boy’s name. It was a strong, brave one, to be sure, but it hardly seemed the sort of thing that Milah would choose. Then again, it seemed there was much he had failed to understand about his wife, given her reaction to his return. He shook his head wearily, trying to keep the memory of her angered face from entering his mind. But he could bear all that, all the rage the world threw at him now. Now he had his boy, and nothing on this earth could tear them apart.

 

—————-

 

They didn’t notice anything wrong with the child for several months. For a time, despite Milah’s initial reaction to her husband’s return, things went smoothly, an almost perfect depiction of family domesticity. Then, one warmer spring morning, they could deny it no longer.

 

While the other babes born during the winter were up and crawling about their mothers’ ankles, their child was stubbornly content to lie still in his crib. Where other babes were babbling away at their parents, theirs was silent, save for its strangely newborn cries. 

 

"Perhaps he’s just a slow bloomer." Rumplestiltskin offered. "I’m sure it happens to plenty of children; he’ll have us running around after him soon enough."

 

He studiously ignored Milah’s remark that there was only one of them fit to be running anywhere after their child, and nothing more was spoken of the subject for some time.

 

After Baelfire’s first birthday there was no doubt that something was wrong. He’d not walk, he’d not even attempt to talk; indeed he couldn’t even sit upright on his blankets. And he was still so small- he’d not grown an inch from the night Milah had brought him home. 

 

What was worse, the other villagers were finally taking notice of the anomaly, now much too far gone to be written off as some developmental abnormality. In addition to the normal jeers and whispers, now the townspeople ignored them entirely, only passing quickly by and leaving mutters of curses and black magic in their wake. 

 

That night, when her husband was asleep, Milah once more journeyed to the stone ring. The winter’s air seemed colder now, more foreboding, though the wind did not howl as before. As she drew near the stones she noticed with dread that the flicking lights were absent. It was as if the energy had gone from the place, leaving it lifeless and cold. 

 

She breached the border of the circle and called out as before, waiting for the voice to reply. But no answer ever came. She called again and again, finally screaming out into the darkness until she thought her throat would bleed. She crumpled to a heap on the snowy ground. It was then she realized her mistake- and the spirit’s price. She’d only asked for a babe. She never asked for it to grow up.

 

——————-

 

The years passed, and still the two cared unceasingly for their unchanging child. If Rumplestiltskin wondered at the cause of their misfortune, he spoke not a word. In truth, he half believed his son’s inability to grow was part of some curse placed upon his house for his cowardice, for thwarting the seer’s prophecy. Perhaps, he began to think, Milah was right in saying that he should have died against the ogres. But then he would lay eyes on his Baelfire, still as beautiful as the day he’d come home, and he couldn’t find it in his heart to regret anything. 

Milah, on the other hand, was near the end of her patience and her sanity. As the difference between Bae and the other children became impossible to ignore, their isolation from the village intensified, to the point that now even Milah’s much frequented taverns denied her entrance. She could not even hope to hitch a ride away from this place, as no traveler in their right mind would give passage to a woman who was clearly cursed.

 

That was why, one morning roughly eight years after she’d made her bargain with the shadows, she could stand it no longer. She looked over at her husband, diligently sewing a child’s shirt far too large for the sleeping babe in the cradle, as if he still held some faint hope that one day Bae might decide to grow after all. 

 

"Haven’t you ever thought about just… ending this madness?" She queried.

 

"What do you mean by that?"

 

"Oh come off it, you know what I mean! It would be so simple just to drop it off somewhere, somewhere some other poor soul could find it, and free ourselves of this curse! We could simply say he had some sickness that took years to kill; no one around here pays enough attention to us that anyone would even notice."

 

"Milah. Please tell me you’re not suggesting what I think you are." Rumplestiltskin paused in his sewing, eyes darkened with something Milah had never seen there before. Something akin to rage.

 

"Wouldn’t it be so much simpler than this? What else are we going to do? Keep tending to it until we both die of old age?"

 

"He’s our son!" He was on his feet now, ruined ankle forgotten, standing protectively between Milah and the cradle like a wolf between its cubs and the hunter.

 

"Do you honestly still believe that?" She laughed desperately. "Gods, he’s not even human!"

 

"What the devil are you on about?"

 

"Oh, what the devil indeed! He’s a faerie child; I dealt for him after you’d gone off to war. He’s not yours anymore than your damn sheep, nor mine neither!"

 

"No. No, I don’t care where he came from or what he is; he’s my son, and I’ll not give him up! Not for you or the whole gods damned world besides!" He was shouting now, and for the first time in her life Milah actually felt a twinge of fear of her husband. Gone was her weak, cowardly little spinner, as if the faeries had changed him as much as they’d kept the child stubbornly the same.

 

"Fine. If you’ll not leave that- that thing, then I’m done with the both of you. You can stay in this damned hovel and rock that cursed abomination until you rot!" With that she stormed from the house, the door swinging almost off its hinges and she fled into the darkness, away from the place she’d called home for so many years. Rumplestiltskin never saw her again.

 

As the sweeping rage left his body, he became increasingly aware of two things: the searing pain in his ankle, and Bae’s cries from behind him, apparently awoken in the commotion. Ignoring his pain, Rumplestiltskin carefully took his son in his arms and rocked him gently to and fro, whispering to the babe.

 

"Shh, it’s alright Bae. Your Papa’s here."

 

——————

 

The tiny house on the edge of the village became something of a legend, and the children of the town would often sit on the crest of a nearby hill- though not near enough to be seen from the house- and try to catch a glimpse of the old man that lived there. It was said the place and the man were cursed, though none in the village would say quite what the curse was. Still, it was said that on winter nights when the wind was high and howling, there would come from the house the distant sound of a crying babe, and the low murmur of an aging voice chanting a lullaby.


End file.
